


At the Mountains of Madness

by Hexiva



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: The Next Generation
Genre: (strictly speaking), Angst, Body Horror, Complete, Eldritch Abomination Q, Interspecies Romance, Literary References & Allusions, M/M, No Sex, Sharing Body Heat, The Works of HP Lovecraft, cosmic horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-25
Updated: 2018-01-03
Packaged: 2019-02-19 23:56:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 15,729
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13134852
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hexiva/pseuds/Hexiva
Summary: After answering a mysterious distress call from an unexplored planet, Picard finds himself trapped on the planet with Q, who has been imprisoned by the Continuum and lacks the ability to shapeshift. Faced with the maddening sight of Q's true form, Picard must confront his own fears and beliefs.





	1. The Call

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to [Alara J Rogers](http://archiveofourown.org/users/AlaraJRogers/pseuds/Alara%20J%20Rogers/) for beta-reading this fic!

The distress call was simple:  _ Help me, Captain Picard.  _ It was plain text, sent out over Starfleet wavelengths directly to the Enterprise - but from an unexplored sector of space, where no Starfleet ship had ever been.

“It doesn’t make sense,” Picard said, not for the first time, as the Enterprise went into orbit around the planet that had originated the distress call. “Who could be out here? And how would they know my name?”

“Transporter accident, maybe?” La Forge suggested. “Sent someone from the Federation all the way out here?”

“A transporter accident severe enough to transport a person to a new solar system would be unlikely to deposit them somewhere survivable,” Data said. “The odds of survival in that situation would be millions to one.”

“And yet someone is down there,” Picard said.

“And they need help,” Riker said.

“Or want us to  _ think  _ they need help,” La Forge said, grimly. “Captain, this could be a trap.”

“I know,” Picard said. “But we cannot ignore a distress call merely because it confuses us. We will simply have to be cautious.”

“Easier said than done,” La Forge said.

“Long range scans indicate an inhabited planet, but lacking in higher technology,” Data said. “The source of the distress call is not far from a small center of population. I suggest we beam a small away team to the center of population and investigate the situation there.”

Picard nodded. “Excellent idea, Mr. Data. Number One, you have the bridge. Mr. Worf, Mr. Data, you will accompany me on the away team.”

“What?!” Riker said. “Captain! We have no idea what’s down there. You can’t beam down.”

“Mr. Riker, whoever’s down there, they asked for  _ me,  _ and I want to know why. No arguments, Number One.”

Riker scowled. “Aye aye, Captain. But at the first sign of trouble, I’m beaming you back aboard whether you like it or not.”

“Understood, Number One. Mr. Worf, Mr. Data, prepare to beam down.”

The three of them took the lift down to the transporter room. “You heading out yourself, Captain?” O’Brien asked. 

“It seems I have been personally requested, Mr. O’Brien,” Picard said.

O’Brien set up the transporter, and hit the button. The glow of the particle transfer came up around them, and through it, Picard saw a planet start to fade into his sight. Then there was a jerk, a flash of light, and his view flickered back and forth between the planet and the transporter beam. “Mr. O’Brien!” he shouted. “Terminate the transporter beam - ” 

O’Brien reached for his console, but before Picard could see what happened, he was back on the planet, and falling through thin air.

He smacked into the ground, hard. Slowly, he pushed himself up from the ground, brushing dirt and twigs off of his face and chest. He looked around and found himself next to a paved white road, sitting in the brush by the side of the road. 

“Worf?” he called out into the fog, getting to his feet. “Data?” 

There was no response. He put a hand to his combadge, and found that it had been shattered in the fall. “Well,” he said, after a moment. “All roads lead to Rome, I suppose.” He started walking along the road. It would lead him somewhere, and perhaps he could find more answers there.

It was about a five minute walk before he reached what he suspected was the population center detected by the long-range scans. It was a small town, with wooden houses and some few, simple vehicles. A few church spires towered over the other buildings. The people there looked human, but they gave him strange and suspicious looks - no doubt because of his clothes. Next to their stiff, drab, formal clothes, Picard’s own uniform looked gaudy and uneven.

He would have to find some local clothes if he was to blend in here. He wondered how best to do this - the only goods he had for barter were his phaser and tricorder, none of which he could afford to put into the hands of these primitive people without disrupting their development. And of course, if the Enterprise didn’t come for him soon, he would need to find food and lodging, as well. 

He came across a house with a rack of clothing drying in front. He looked around. No one was watching them. 

Ordinarily, Picard would never resort to base theft, but he was conscious of the Prime Directive. These people didn’t have space travel, and they were out in an unexplored system, far away from any other intelligent species. He could not allow them to discover him as an alien, and that required that he fit in.

He grabbed two articles of clothing, hoping that they were appropriate to his apparent gender, and exited the scene quickly. Finding an out-of-the-way corner, he pulled off his shirt and put them on over his uniform pants. They were slightly too big, but he thought he would pass muster as a native. 

He hid his phaser and tricorder under the clothing and re-entered the town, drawing much less attention this time. Good, he thought. He wandered the foggy streets, observing the low technology level, the way the people still gave him suspicious glances. 

He found the local equivalent of a bar or cafe and walked in, trying to seem like he belonged. He sat down at the central, not ordering anything. 

One of the other patrons cast him a suspicious look. Picard returned it calmly. “Is there a problem?” he asked.

“Don’t see many strangers around these parts,” the other man said. “You from the big city?”

Picard nodded. “Yes. I needed a change of pace.”

“And you came here?” The man snorted. “God help you.”

“What makes you say that?” Picard asked. He kept his tone casual.

The man shook his head. “Won’t find many people willing to ask that question. It’s bad luck to speak of it.”

Picard’s eyebrows went up. “‘It’?” he asked.

The man frowned. “Here’s a tip for free, stranger,” he said, getting up. “Don’t ask too many questions. It makes people around here nervous.” He paid his tab and left. 

Picard frowned off into the distance. That was a curious response. What was happening to this town? Did it have anything to do with the distress call?

He checked his tricorder covertly. The coordinates of the distress call were to the west of the town - but there could be anything in between him and it. Without a map, he couldn’t necessarily go directly to the coordinates. 

He exited the bar and wandered through a few more stores, until finally he found one selling a map. He picked it up. He found that the town was named Quachil, and the ‘big city’ the man had referenced was named Larich. But to the west of the town was a mostly blank space, marked simply ‘The Ruins.’

He went to the counter. “I’m visiting family here from Larich,” he said to the clerk. “While I’m here, I thought I’d go hiking - see the sights. Can you recommend anything I should see?”

The clerk looked up at him resentfully. “Nothing. Just your average small town. I wouldn’t advise walking around outside of town. It can be . . . dangerous . . . around these parts.”

Picard unfolded the map on the counter. “What about these ‘ruins’ just outside of town?” he asked. “That seems interesting.”

The effect on the clerk was immediate. He leaned over the counter, his face close to Picard’s. “Don’t go there,” he hissed. “It’s not safe. There are . . . things . . . there.”

“What sort of things?” Picard pressed, certain he had come to the heart of the issue.

“Things man was not meant to see, stranger,” the clerk said. “The last person to go wandering in those parts came back gibbering and drooling. Don’t let your curiosity get the better of you. Stay in town, where it’s safe.”

“Hmm,” Picard said. “I’ll bear that in mind. Thank you for warning me.” He folded the map back up and put it back on the shelf. 

“You’d better,” the clerk said. 

“I will,” Picard lied, and left the store.

He had a lot to think about. So the distress call had come from an area of the planet that all the locals were afraid of. Perhaps there were Starfleet personnel there, who had become trapped by the same transporter failure that had affected Picard. Perhaps it was even the Starfleet personnel that terrified the locals - unfamiliar technology mistaken for something demonic.

Outside, it was getting dark. The street was shrouded in fog, and the few people still out hurried, with their heads down, to get back to their homes. Their movements were fast, furtive, like mice fleeing a hawk. Fear and distrust were ingrained into their every movement, as if they had been afraid so long they had forgotten how to be any other way. 

What were they so frightened of? Picard wondered. An oppressive government, a hostile neighboring country, a dangerous environment?

Or was it the thing in the ruins?

Picard pushed that thought away, and turned his mind to his own situation. He didn’t plan on venturing out into unfamiliar territory in the dark; he needed somewhere to spend the night. 

His gaze scanned the town’s horizon, and caught on the spire of a church. In his own planet’s past, he knew, it had often fallen to religious organizations to care for poor and homeless citizens. Perhaps he could find sanctuary there. 

He found his way through the shadowed streets towards the church. The doors were locked, but he could see light through the windows. He knocked on the door. No one answered. He knocked again, harder this time. 

Finally, the door opened just a crack. He saw the frightened face of a woman, somewhat older than himself, clad in high-collared, stiff grey robes. “What do you want?” she demanded.

So much for religious charity on the planet. Still, it was now pitch-black outside, and Picard had nowhere else to go. “Please, ma’am,” he said. “I need shelter. I have nowhere to stay.”

“What are you?!” the woman snapped. 

Not  _ who,  _ Picard noticed.  _ What.  _ “I’m just a traveller,” he assured her. 

The woman’s eyes darted suspiciously up and down to take him in. “I’ve heard of travellers like you,” she said. “Strangers who come out of the ruins on ill nights and beg to be let into holy places.”

“The ruins,” Picard noted out loud. “Why do you think I came from the ruins?”

“This town was built too close to the ruins of the old church,” the woman said. “Back when men and women were ruled by dark things from the stars, when they worshipped unholy and alien gods. Times have changed now. But sometimes, things come out of the ruins that were not meant to be seen.” 

“Ma’am, I assure you, I am nothing other than what I appear to be,” Picard lied. “I’m just a man with nowhere else to go. I come from Larich, and I only mean to stay the night. Please. I planned to stay with my son in town, but we had a falling out, and now I have nowhere to go.”

“Then why did you come  _ here?”  _ the woman snapped.

“Where I come from,” Picard said, holding her gaze, “Churches are a place of charity, where those who have nothing might find aid and sanctuary. Where people come, not only to worship their gods, but also to help their fellow man in their time of need. Is there no room in your religion for that kind of human kindness?” 

“What good is kindness if it means letting unholy creatures from out of the ruins into my church?” the woman demanded.

“No god worth serving would ask you to turn away a traveller in need,” Picard answered.

The woman stared at him for a long moment. Picard lifted his chin, and looked back.

Without warning, the woman slammed the door in his face. Picard sighed, and turned away, trying to think where else he could go - before the door opened again, and the woman shoved an armful of worn blankets at him. “Thank you,” he said, surprised.

“Take it,” she snapped. “There’s an old gardener’s shed over by the left side of the church - you can sleep in there. Now go away, demon - or traveller or whatever you are.” And she slammed the door in his face again.

“Well, beggars can’t be choosers,” Picard said, to the shut door. His arms full of blankets, he found his way to the shed and let himself in. It was a small, cramped structure of wood, with no lights, and Picard nearly stepped on a rake before he got his bearings. But he made the best of it, shoved the gardening tools into the corner, and wrapped himself in the blankets.The floor was cold and hard, but it was better than nothing.

Finally, he slept.

* * *

 

He woke up early the next morning after a cold and uncomfortable night, and left the shed before the woman could find him there. He was hungry, but he doubted he would find any food for free within the town. If he set out for the ruins now, he might find some edible plants on the way.

He started walking. The morning was cold and foggy, and there was no path leading towards the ruins, so he had to make his way through wet brush and over uneven ground, shivering.

He came across several berry bushes and scanned them with his tricorder, but none of them registered as edible. The only edible thing he found was some sort of shelf fungus, which his tricorder informed him would be edible if cooked. He picked it, and shoved it into one of his pockets for later.

The temple loomed up out of the fog suddenly, startling him. It was an ancient, ruined structure of black stone, decorated with statues of half-formed, frightening beings. 

“Well,” he said to no one. “It appears we’ve arrived.”

He entered the temple from the main entrance, following his tricorder to the source of the distress call. Inside was an antechamber consisting of a broad set of stairs leading up to a central door. The walls were lined with more indistinct statues.

The source of the distress call was located beyond the antechamber. He ascended the stairs and went through the door.

The central chamber was cavernous. It was a huge, dark chamber made of black stone. It should have been impossible to see anything, but there was a weird, flickering light coming from above. Picard looked up into the ceiling and saw - something. Something huge and writhing, made of a substance halfway between flesh and energy, tendrils stretching out in more than three dimensions.

Something deep and visceral in his mind rebelled at the sight of it. He struggled to make sense of its twisting shapes, and failed. Terror pulsed through him, and he knew immediately why the locals had warned him away from this place. 

Suddenly, a pair of hands took him by his shoulders and tugged him back, towards the antechamber. “Look away,  _ mon capitaine,  _ for the sake of your tiny human mind.”

Picard couldn’t tear his eyes away from the thing in the temple, but he backed away willingly, following the hands on his shoulders until the door shut between his eyes and the creature, and he almost fell down the stairs. 

Picard sank to the ground, one hand on the wall. 

“I wasn’t expecting you, or I would have met you at the door,” said his rescuer, and Picard recognized him, with a distant sense of surprise, as Q.

“Q,” he said heavily. He had never been more glad to see the entity. “What was that - that  _ thing?”  _

Q looked offended. “‘ _ That thing’?  _ Why, Captain, I’m hurt. All these years we’ve known each other, and you can’t even recognize me when I’m right in front of you?”

Picard stared at Q blankly for a few moments before it slowly dawned on him. “That - was  _ you?”  _ he asked. “Your - true form?”

“In the flesh,” Q confirmed. “Or something like it. You should be more careful, Picard. Humans have gone mad from seeing my true form before.”

“Then - what the locals said was true?” Picard managed. 

Q waved a hand vaguely. “Insofar as their limited, tiny minds can understand, yes.”

“It doesn’t make sense,” Picard insisted. “You cannot go mad simply from seeing another living being -  _ exist.”  _

Q laughed. “But you would have,” he said, “If I hadn’t gotten you out of there. You could feel it. The  _ terror.  _ The  _ horror.  _ The sheer inability to  _ comprehend.”  _

Picard shuddered. Perhaps he had gotten in the habit of thinking of Q as merely a powerful human, had forgotten what the entity really was. “I need a moment to - to think about this,” he said, faintly, leaning against the wall.

Q looked at him with more compassion than Picard would have thought he was capable of. “Sleep,  _ mon capitaine,”  _ he said, gently. “You’ll be safe here with me.”

Picard meant to say that he needed answers before he went to sleep, but his fatigued brain had other ideas, and when he opened his mouth, all that came out was a yawn. He slid down to lie awkwardly on the top step. “Just for a moment,” he mumbled, resting his head on the cold rock floor.


	2. The Creature Out Of Space

When he next woke up, he felt much warmer, and there was fabric between his head and the rock. He sat up, yawning, and opened his eyes to find that he was blindfolded. “What - ? Q!” He reached up to untie the fabric.

_ Something  _ curled around his hands and stopped them, something that felt like a tendril made out of crackling energy, burning and tingling against his skin.  _ Don’t look,  _ said a voice in his head.

The tendril pulled back, and was replaced by a set of warm, human hands, leading him back out of the central chamber. Once back in the antechamber, he pulled the blindfold off and glared at Q. “Why did you bring me back in there?” he demanded.

“You were shivering in your sleep,” Q explained. “There’s more space to build a fire in the other room, and my body heat keeps the chamber warm. I thought you’d be fine as long as I covered your eyes.”

Picard swallowed. He didn’t like the thought of being so vulnerable, least of all in front of Q. “Did you bring me here?” he demanded. “To this planet?”

“In a way,” Q said, frowning. “I sent the distress signal.”

“Why?” Picard asked. 

“Oh, why does anyone send a distress call?” Q gestured expansively. 

Picard frowned. “You mean to say you really are in some sort of trouble here?”

“You could say that,” Q said. 

“Are you going to explain yourself, or are you going to make me play twenty questions here, Q?” Picard said, irritated.

“Oh, why should I bother explaining anything when it’s so fun to watch your little human mind run in circles?” Q draped himself over the stairs and looked up at the ceiling. “I’m stuck here,” he said. 

“Stuck - ?” Picard asked. “How is that possible? With your power - ”

“I don’t have my power,” Q snapped. “Or at least, not most of it. It’s all I can do to maintain this illusion for you to communicate with. I can’t even change my real form. And I can’t leave the planet.”

“What happened?” Picard demanded.

“Another disagreement with my fellows in the Continuum,” Q said. 

“They didn’t make you mortal this time?” Picard asked.

“No.” Q scowled. “I believe their exact wording would translate to ‘You’d enjoy that too much.’ Instead they trapped me here, helpless on a world I made millions of years ago and abandoned a long time ago.”

“And so you called . . .  _ me  _ for help?” Picard asked.

“Well, who else was I going to call?” Q gestured irately. “The Calamarain? Guinan?” He shook his head. “Speaking of that witch, where is your ship and the rest of your little apes?”

“As far as I know, the Enterprise is still in orbit around this planet,” Picard said, grimly. “I attempted to beam down here with an away team, but only I arrived. I don’t know where the others are.”

Q scowled. “So they planned ahead for me to summon help and put an anti-transport field around the planet,” he complained. “And did a sloppy job of it too, or you wouldn’t be here. Whatever happened to having  _ pride  _ in your work?” He threw up his hands in disgust.

“This anti-transport field,” Picard said urgently, “What would it do to my crewmembers? Worf, and Data - are they still alive?” 

“Probably,” Q said. “The anti-transport field should simply have returned them to their original location.”

Picard relaxed slightly. “So only I am trapped here, then,” he said.

“You  _ and  _ me,” Q pointed out, smirking. “I have to say, Captain, now that you’re here, the next few decades of my imprisonment is going to be much more entertaining. How long do you humans live for again?”

“I am  _ not  _ going to spend the rest of my life here, Q!” Picard snapped.

“You don’t have any choice,” Q said, flatly. “Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t get you off this planet any more than your human friends can.”

Picard’s heart sank. “There must be some way,” he said. “I won’t give up hope that easily.” 

Q gestured vaguely. “Be my guest. I’ll even help you, in whatever way I can. But don’t expect it to work. If I couldn’t do it, you don’t have a prayer.”

“What have you tried so far?”

“Everything,” Q said. “Begging for help from a bunch of under-evolved primates wasn’t exactly my first choice, you know. I ran through a few thousand other options before I resorted to building a Federation communications array.”

“Building?” Picard questioned. “So you couldn’t use your powers to send the distress call, you had to actually build a physical device?”

“Well, you don’t have to rub it in, Picard,” Q snapped. “I can’t use my powers to affect anything outside of this planet.”

“Show me your communications array,” Picard ordered.

“I can see you’re feeling like your usual bossy self again,” Q said, snidely, but he disappeared into the central chamber, and returned, hauling a makeshift mess of machinery gathered in his arms. “Not the most elegant solution,” he said, setting it down on the ground. “But it works. Oh! I almost forgot.” He disappeared into the other room, and re-appeared holding a creamy brown shelf fungus. It took Picard a moment to realize that it was the same fungus he had collected on his journey here.

“I found it in your pockets while I was blindfolding you,” Q explained. “And then I cooked it on the fire. It should be edible to humans now.” He passed it to Picard, who took it, dumbfounded.

The cooked fungus had a warm, starchy smell, and Picard’s stomach growled, provoking a laugh from Q. Without further ado, Picard took a big bite of the fungus. He wasn’t used to going without food, and his hunger made the fungus taste like the most delicious gourmet meal he’d ever had. He wolfed it down and wished there was more.

“Thank you,” he said, after a moment, a note of surprise in his voice. It was an unusually considerate gesture from Q of all people. 

“You sound so shocked, Jean-Luc,” Q said, smirking. “Hasn’t anyone ever fed you a Quachilian Shelf Fungus before?”

  
“No, no, I can’t say they have,” Picard said, with amusement. “Given that I’ve never been to this planet before.”

“Then you’ve been missing out.” Q sat down and lounged back against the wall. 

“So explain this communications array of yours to me,” Picard said, getting up to look closer at it. “How did you make it? I didn’t see a lot of technology back in the village.”

Q waved a hand. “Oh, they have some primitive electrical wiring in Larich that I could use to make subspace circuitry. A few of the pieces I had to make by hand - fortunately, it doesn’t take too much of my energy to melt metal.”

Picard examined the circuitry and was impressed. It had been a long time since engineering classes at Starfleet Academy, but he thought he understood the basic function. “Q, could this be modified to get a message to Riker?” he asked. 

“Probably. Why, what is there to say to him?” Q asked.

“I’d like to see if he can beam me back up, once he knows what’s preventing the transporter beam.”

“What, and leave me here all alone?” Q said, pouting.

Picard frowned. It was true, he didn’t like the idea of abandoning Q to his fate. He tried to tell himself that Q deserved this - but all he could think of was lying on an operating table, his heart failing, and Q’s voice offering him a choice. Q had saved his life. Didn’t he owe him something for that?

“Well, it’s no use worrying about that until we know if it’s possible,” Picard said. “And if it’s not, then I must transfer command of the Enterprise to him.”

Q frowned up at him. “This is important to you, isn’t it?” he asked.

“Of course it is,” Picard said. “It’s my duty.”

Q sighed dramatically. “Then I suppose I’ll have to help you with it.” He sprang up and came over to the communications array. “I’ll show you how to re-arrange the circuitry to send a different message. In the meantime, I’ll work on developing a receiver.”

Picard glanced up at him. “Thank you, Q,” he said.

“Don’t fall over yourself with gratitude, I haven’t done it yet.”

* * *

 

They worked on their combined projects until Picard was stopped by hunger pangs. He set down the makeshift tool he had been using to adjust the circuitry. “I’m going to go foraging for food,” he said. “Perhaps I can find more of that fungus.”

“I’ll go with you,” Q said, getting to his feet. “I can show you the best places for it.”

Q led him to a tree covered in shelf fungus. Picard started to gather them, and, when his arms were full, tried to hand some of them to Q.

His hands passed right through Q’s form. Picard blinked, and looked at Q. The entity’s image was slightly transparent, flickering and unreal. “Are you all right?” he asked.

“Yes,” Q said, and his voice sounded distant. “But it takes more - energy - to project further away from my true form. Hurry up, let’s get back to the ruins.”

Picard stuffed the fungus into his shirt instead, and started to gather more. “I’ve been wondering about your nature,” he said. “Would you be offended if I asked you some questions?”

“No, but I can’t promise I’ll be able to explain the answers in words of one syllable or less,” Q said, leaning his illusory form up against a tree. “Ask away,  _ mon capitaine.” _

“If merely seeing your true form is enough to madden humans, how is it that Riker was able to survive being transformed into a Q?” Picard asked.

“Because he wasn’t,” Q said, with a shrug. “I just gave him a taste of my powers. If he had accepted my offer, of course, he would’ve become a true Q. Since he refused, though, he never became anything other than a human with powers. If he had, he wouldn’t’ve fallen for your little ruse with the ‘gifts.’”

“That was  _ your  _ idea, Q,” Picard said. “I simply didn’t stop him.”

Q waved it off. “Same difference.”

Picard sighed and gathered up the fungus in his shirt. “Let’s get going,” he said. They started to walk back to the ruins.

“Are you afraid of me, Jean-Luc?” Q asked abruptly, as they walked.

His knee-jerk response was to deny it immediately. But instead, he stopped to consider.  _ Was  _ he afraid of Q? Right now? There had been times when he had been, frankly, terrified of Q, and seeing him as a writhing, maddening creature should not have helped. 

But he also remembered Q walking him through the regrets of his past, Q guiding him to save humanity, Q simply cooking him a meal because he was cold and hungry. Had Q changed? Or had Picard’s perception of him? 

“Should I be?” he asked instead. “Do you pose a threat to me or to humanity?”

Q crossed his arms, sulkily. “Why should I care what happens to a bunch of savage primitives?” he asked.

“That’s a good question,” Picard said, fixing him with a look. “Because clearly, you  _ do  _ care what happens to humanity. Or, at least, to me.”

Q scowled. “You give yourself too much credit, as always, Picard.”

“I’m not the one who asked  _ you  _ here to help,” Picard shot back. “Do you pose a threat, Q?”

“No!” Q snapped. “I’m trying to  _ help.  _ I have been for a long time. It’s not my fault if you’re too simple-minded to see that.”

“How long is ‘a long time’?” Picard asked, raising his eyebrows. 

“Since Vash, perhaps,” Q said. “Or maybe before. I did tell you I wanted to do something nice for you.”

Picard’s eyebrows shot up. “You dressed me up as Robin Hood and threatened to kill an innocent woman if I didn’t dance for your amusement!”

“Yes, well, there was some trial-and-error, of course . . .”

“Trial and error?!” Picard demanded.

“Ah, but I got it right in the end, didn’t I?!” Q pointed a transparent finger at Picard. “I came back. I helped you.”

“Yes,” Picard said, calming slightly. “Yes, you did.” There was a long pause as they walked. “Why did you do it, Q?” he asked. “No - no, more than that. How did you  _ know  _ that what you did would help me?”

“I’m omniscient, Jean-Luc, I know everything.”

“Yes, but before you’ve never seemed particularly . . . ” Picard searched for a word. “ . . .  _ Sensitive  _ to the desires of mortals.”

“What a hurtful thing to say!” Q said, putting his hand to his heart. “And you accuse  _ me  _ of being insensitive!”

“But you  _ are  _ insensitive,” Picard pressed. “Or you were. What changed, Q?”

Q was silent for a moment, and at first, Picard thought he was sulking. Then he said, “How long was it, in between Amanda Rogers’ ascension and your death on the operating table?”

Picard frowned, thinking back. “Perhaps half a year.”

“For me, it was at least a millennia,” Q said, flatly. 

Picard went silent. “A millennia?” he asked.

“As you would count it. Yes,” Q said. “Time isn’t linear, Jean-Luc. The fact that you perceive it so is just an artefact of your limited human perspective.”

“That is a very long time,” Picard said. “I’m surprised you remembered me at all, after all those years.”

"And suddenly you're a model of humility,” Q said, waving his hand. “Really, I said don't give yourself too  _ much  _ credit, not none at all."

“If I didn’t know better, Q, I might take that for a compliment,” Picard said, with amusement. 

“Don’t get too big for your britches, Picard,” Q said. 

“I’ll try to bear that in mind,” Picard said, dryly. The temple loomed up in front of them, and Picard set the fungi down on the ground and set about gathering wood for a fire, while Q lounged against the walls of the temple. 

Picard ignited the wood with his phaser, and skewered one of the fungi on a stick. To his faint surprise, Q picked up another stick and did the same. 

They roasted the fungi over the fire. Picard kept his eyes on the fire, not wanting to look up at the looming, shapeless statues lining the walls of the temple. They reminded him too much of what he had seen in its central room. 

“You said you - created this world?” he asked Q, hoping to distract himself. 

“Yes, unfortunately. You know, there aren’t a lot of things in my life that I regret, but creating this chilly little dirtball and its close-minded, ignorant people is certainly right at the top of the list.” Q propped his chin up on his hand and scowled. “I really thought they were quite interesting when I created them. I don’t know how they became so  _ boring.”  _

Picard frowned at him. “They’re afraid of you,” he said. 

“I know!” Q gestured wildly with his fungus-laden stick. “Because their tiny little minds can’t comprehend what I really am any more than you can. They were happy to worship me and build me temples when I appeared to them in  _ their  _ form.”

Picard sighed. “I can’t understand it,” he said. “Why the sight of your true form should have such an effect on them. Or on me, for that matter. I am a thinking being. Why should the sight of a fellow sentient being  -  _ distress  _ me so?”

“Because you can’t make sense of it,” Q said, with a slight smirk. “The fear of the unknown - it’s coded into your very DNA.”

“I refuse to believe that,” Picard said, firmly. “I am more than my instincts. I am an intelligent, rational being, and I am not afraid of what I don’t understand. That is the mission of Starfleet: to seek out the unknown, to  _ learn  _ from it. I will not cower in the shadows of my own ignorance.”

Q pulled his fungus out of the fire and leaned back against a rock, twirling the stick idly in the air. “Wasn’t it one of your own human writers who said, ‘We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far’?”

It took Picard a few moments to search through his memory and place the quote. “Lovecraft,” he said, with faint disdain. “The man found nearly half of his own species to be too ‘alien’ for his tastes. He was a fool.”

“I told you the first time we met that your species wasn’t ready for what you’d find out here in the vast, endless universe. There are worse things than the Borg out there, Picard.”

Picard laughed out loud. There was a bitter tone to it.  “You think you’re worse than the Borg?” He raised his eyebrows. “You’ve made my life worse in many ways, both great and small, but you’ve never torn away my very identity.”

Q drew himself up, with mock offense. “I’ll have to do better next time, then,” he said. “Any requests?”

“If I thought you took requests, I’d have told you to go away more often,” Picard said, but he was surprised to find that there was no real heat to it. He pulled the fungus out of the fire and reached out to pull it off the stick - yanking his hand back quickly and sticking his fingers into his mouth.

“Always so impatient,  _ mon capitaine,”  _ Q said, amused. He pulled his fungus off of the stick and passed it to Picard. “Here. You can eat this one while yours is cooling off.”

“Thank you,” Picard said, taking it with his uninjured hand. He leaned back and took a bite out of the fungus, staring up at the sky. The stars were beginning to come out, in unfamiliar constellations. He tried to remember how long it had been since he had seen the constellations of his own planet.

“They used to call that one after me,” Q said, pointing up in the sky. Picard followed his finger, and saw a constellation of stars that might have made a stylized Q. “And that one there, that was one of their kings, back in the day. He was a real bore. The one up and to the right was a mountain, and the one to its right was a bird.” He leaned back against the rock. “Never saw it, myself. I can see the stars for what they really are. Just big balls of gas. Nothing special about it.” There was a note of regret in his voice that gave the lie to his airy words. 

“I always thought stars were more impressive up close,” Picard commented. “From down here, they seem to be nothing but specks of light. But when you’re in orbit, with the proper shields up, you can see the differences in texture, the plasma roiling with the incredible force of solar reactions. Every star is different.”

“You only say that because you haven’t seen all of them before like I have,” Q said. “Once you’ve seen a few million stars up close, you’ve seen them all.”

Picard was silent for awhile, looking up at the stars and thinking about that. What it must be like, to be so ancient and so powerful that even the stars no longer held any wonder at all? He couldn’t imagine it.

“How old are you, truly?” he asked.

“Hmmm . . .” Q looked thoughtful, and started counting on his fingers. He quickly ran out of fingers. “A few . . . billion . . . years?” he guessed. 

_ A few billion years.  _ “Then you’re older than the human race itself,” Picard said. 

“Oh, easily. You humans are really just a blip on the timeline of history.”

“And yet you concern yourself so closely with our affairs,” Picard said, faintly amused. He didn’t believe that Q disdained the human race as much as he claimed to. If he did, why would he keep coming back?

“Giving yourself airs again, I see,” Q shot back. “You humans are moderately amusing, yes, for a lesser race, but I have other pursuits.”

“Somehow, when you put it like that, I find that hard to believe.”

“I spent a hundred years developing Rantillian interdimensional ticks! I spent a thousand years being worshipped as a god on Beris 9! I spent ten years carving the surface of Benkorion with insulting messages!” Q threw up his hands, in a show of disbelief. “And here I am, having my accomplishments denigrated by a hairless ape with delusions of grandeur. How the mighty have fallen!”

Picard snorted. “‘Delusions of grandeur,’ indeed. Are you sure you’re not talking about yourself?”

“It’s not a delusion when  _ I  _ do it. I really  _ am  _ grand.” Q crossed his arms. 

Picard snorted again. “You really are a ridiculous creature.” 

“You simply don’t have the capacity to  _ appreciate  _ my grandeur,” Q huffed. 

Picard finished off the last of his fungus and stood. “I’m going to go to sleep. We can continue work on the subspace communicator tomorrow morning.” He went back into the temple, where it was drier and marginally warmer, and stretched out on the top step. 

“Goodnight, Jean-Luc,” Q said, silhouetted against the outer door.

Picard smiled. “Goodnight, Q.” And he slept. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for waiting (overnight)! As always, please leave a comment, if you can - I'd love to hear your thoughts on this chapter.


	3. The Familiar and the Unknown

In the darkness of his dreams, he faced the Borg again. He was on Earth, tending grapevines in France, when the Borg cube appeared in the skies. 

_ “Resistance is futile.”  _ The words echoed out over the world, as if projected by enormous speakers.  _ “Lay down your weapons and you will be assimilated.” _

But as he watched, the orderly lines of the Borg cube became more chaotic, the cube shape distorting into a twisted tesseract, its circuitry becoming tendrils of energy, until he was looking up at the thing in the temple, filling the sky above him, blotting out the sun.

And it reached down to touch him, and he felt his skin transform under its touch, circuitry and wires sprouting from his skin. The Borg’s orders echoed in his mind, and when he opened his mouth to scream, all that came out was Locutus’s cold, calm voice.

“Jean-Luc! Wake up!” 

Picard blinked, and found himself face to face with Q’s human form. “Q . . . ?” he asked, unsteadily. 

Q’s hands were on his shoulders. “You were making noises in your sleep,” he explained. “I thought something was wrong.”

“I - I’m fine.” Picard pulled back, rubbing his face with one hand. “It was just a dream.”

“I know,” Q said. “I looked, to be sure.”

Picard couldn’t summon the energy to be outraged at Q reading his mind. He was just glad to wake up and find himself still human, still himself. The dreams always took him that way. “What did you see?” he asked.

“Myself, among other things,” Q said. “I thought you said you weren’t afraid of me.” He paused, as if fighting with himself, and then added, “You don’t need to be, truly, Jean-Luc Picard. I don’t want you to be afraid.”

“I’m  _ not  _ afraid of you,” Picard snapped. Arguing with Q was strangely comforting, a twisted sense of normalcy. Locutus would never have argued with a god. “Or, at least, my rational mind isn’t.” He scowled and crossed his arms. “Something base inside of me seems to reject what I saw through that door.” He nodded towards the central chamber. “But it’s not true fear. Or, at least, it’s not truly my fear. It’s more basic than that, a vestigial instinct.”

“There are those who’ve gone stark raving mad from shorter glimpses of my majesty than you got,” Q said. “Really, under the circumstances, you’re holding up quite well.”

“I don’t need pity from you of all people, Q,” Picard snapped, wrapping his arms around his body. He was freezing. 

“I’m not ‘people,’” Q said lightly. “I’m  _ me.”  _ He looked Picard up and down. “I can see we’re going to have to find you some warmer blankets and clothing, if you’re to stay here.”

“I’m not your pet,” Picard snapped.

Q gave him a sidelong look that lasted a bit too long. “No,” he agreed. “But you’re the only half-decent conversation I’m likely to get while stuck on this godforsaken planet, so you’ll excuse me if the thought of your untimely death by hypothermia doesn’t amuse me much.”

“Hah,” Picard said, weakly. 

“Here,” Q said, getting to his feet and exiting the temple for a moment. When he returned, he was carrying a pile of huge, flat leaves, which he shook off. Picard saw steam float off them, and knew that Q had used his powers to dry them.

Q carried the leaves over to Picard and piled them on top of him. “Not the same as a replicated blanket, but it ought to keep your fragile human body from freezing.”

Picard lay back down, and adjusted the leaves to cover himself evenly. It  _ did  _ help. “Thank you,” he said, softly.

“Wait,” Q said, and before Picard could object, he had slithered his human body under the leaves and taken Picard in his arms.

Picard stiffened. “What are you doing, Q?” he asked.

“Keeping you warm,  _ mon capitaine,”  _ Q said. “Relax. I promise not to get frisky with you.”

Picard meant to object further, but Q’s body was warm against his, under the leaves, and for the first time since he had arrived on this planet, he didn’t feel cold. “Just for tonight,” he allowed.

“Whatever you say, Jean-Luc,” Q said, amused.

Picard drifted back to sleep in the entity’s arms. This time, he didn’t dream of anything.

* * *

 

When he next woke up, the sun was rising outside of the temple, and Q was up and working on the subspace communicator in the corner of the antechamber. 

“Any progress?” Picard asked, sitting up.

“This business of pushing around bits of metal with your clumsy flesh and bone bits is so inefficient,” Q said. “It’s much easier to accomplish this sort of thing when you can simply will it into shape with your mind.” He sighed heavily.

“Unless you can find some way of restoring your powers, you’re going to have to get used to it,” Picard said. He rubbed the sleep out of his eyes. “Let me help.” He knelt down and started working from the opposite side, adjusting each circuit in order. 

It was midday by the time they finished the receiver. It took Picard a few tries to lock on to the Enterprise’s frequency. “Picard to Enterprise,” he said, into the receiver. “Do you read me?”

There was an agonizing wait before they finally heard Riker’s voice answer. “Captain! We’ve been trying to get a lock on your location to beam you up, but something’s interfering with it.”

“It’s the Q,” Picard explained. “They’ve put up an anti-transport field around the planet.”

“You mean this was all a trap for you?” Riker exclaimed.

“Not exactly,” Picard said, looking at Q. “But I suppose I am trapped nonetheless. Commander Riker, we will keep looking for a way to get out of here, but if that proves impossible, you  _ must  _ take command of the Enterprise and continue her mission.”

“‘We,’ sir?” Riker questioned. “Is someone there with you?”

“Did you miss me, Will?” Q asked, snidely.

“Q is trapped on this planet as well,” Picard explained, reluctantly.

There was a short pause. “Are you safe, sir?” Riker asked, concerned.

“From him? I believe I am,” Picard said evenly, his eyes still locked with Q’s. “Certainly, if he wishes to hurt me, I am in no more danger on the same planet with him than I would be light-years away.”

“Be careful, Captain,” Riker said, sounding unhappy. “Now that we have contact, we can send down a shuttlecraft to pick you up.”

“Won’t work,” Q said. “Blocking transports is finicky work. Blocking physical entities from landing on the planet is simple.”

“We’ll try it anyway,” Riker said. 

“Do that. Picard out,” Picard said, and ended the transmission. He leaned back on the ground, feeling suddenly exhausted. Somehow, his exile on this planet hadn’t seemed real until he heard Riker’s voice. Now he found himself facing the possibility of living out his remaining years on one single planet, stranded alone with Q. 

“Well, you’ve dutifully alerted your little pets of your situation,” Q said. “Now what?”

“Now,” Picard said, turning to Q, “We need to talk.”

“Oh?” Q raised an eyebrow. “Then talk away,  _ mon capitaine.”  _

“If you expect me to stay here, in this temple, with you, you will cease referring to me, my crew, and my species in denigrating terms,” Picard stated.

Q’s other eyebrow went up to join the first. “If I expect you to stay here?  _ Mon capitaine,  _ you don’t have any other choice. You’re stuck here with me.”

“That’s not true,” Picard said. “I’m stuck on this  _ planet.  _ But  _ I  _ can blend in with the natives. I could go back to that little town, or to Larich, and start a new life for myself.”

“And leave me here alone?” Q scrambled to his feet. “You  _ wouldn’t.”  _

“I would,” Picard said. “I am willing to keep you company, Q, but in return, I demand  _ respect.  _ I will not be treated like a fly you haven’t gotten around to swatting.”

Q stared down at him. “I could make you stay,” he said. “I might not have the power I once did, but even a human with a few inches on you could keep you prisoner here.”

Picard inclined his head. “You could, it’s true. There is nothing I could do to stop you.” He stood, and looked Q in the eyes. “Once, you told me that the Q were morally superior to humanity. Once, you put us on trial for savagery. True ethical standards - true moral superiority - don’t just vanish when there’s something you want. The choice is entirely in your hands, Q.”

Q’s human face slowly morphed into a scowl. “Damn you, Jean-Luc,” he said.

“Well?” Picard prompted. “Do you agree, or not?”

Q threw up his hands. “Yes! Yes, I agree. This is blackmail, Picard, blatant extortion.”

“It is not extortion to refuse to remain in a relationship where one is not treated with respect,” Picard retorted.

Immediately, the pique vanished from Q’s face, replaced by fascination. “‘Relationship’? Why, Captain, I didn’t know you thought of me that way!”

_ How could I not, with you sneaking into my bed at every opportunity?  _ Picard thought. “That’s not what I meant. I mean, if we are to maintain any sort of - of - companionship - ” He stumbled over his own words. “We must set terms - I mean - Boundaries - ”

“Why, Picard, I think you might be blushing.” Q stepped into Picard’s personal space and ran his fingers down Picard’s cheek. 

“Stop that,” Picard ordered, catching Q’s hand in his own, and pushing it away. 

“If you say so, Captain,” Q said, with a smirk. Picard had a feeling that he hadn’t heard the last of this topic, even as Q’s form faded suddenly out of view, and he was left alone in the antechamber. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're nearly at the halfway point here! Thank you all for your comments. I'm pretty proud of this chapter and, as always, I'd love to hear what you think of it.


	4. Differences

Q returned the next morning, and sat with him as he ate breakfast. “I’m getting rather tired of these fungi,” Picard commented. “I wonder, do you think the townspeople might be willing to trade goods or currency for them?”

“Hmmmmm,” Q said. “It would have been possible back in the day. I don’t know about now, though.” He shook his head. “They’ve grown so  _ suspicious.” _

“They’re afraid,” Picard said. “They don’t understand what you are, and you haven’t given them any reason to.”

“And, what, you think I should appear to them and explain myself? They’d go mad. And besides, aren’t you the one who believes in the Prime Directive? Not messing around with lesser civilizations and not telling them things they’re better off not knowing?”

“The Prime Directive isn’t meant to keep people in the dark,” Picard objected.

“No. It’s meant to keep them safe. But it’s the same thing, as you well know. Sometimes it’s safer to stay on your placid isle of ignorance.”

“Does that apply to your people, too?” Picard challenged.

“We don’t have ignorance,” Q said. “I am all-knowing. Or at least, I was before I got trapped here.” He thumped his fist on the ground in a very human gesture of annoyance. 

“You cannot apply different standards to yourself, simply because you have you have great power,” Picard argued. “Might does not make right.”

“Why not? Isn’t that exactly what you people do?” Q leaned back against a rock with his hands laced behind his head. “You don’t exactly beam down to a primitive planet and give them all your secrets.”

“Because that would irreparably damage their culture,” Picard said. “They need to develop on their own, not to have their world reshaped by forces outside their control. They wouldn’t be the same culture anymore if we interfered with them.”

“Exactly,” Q said. “There are some things they - you - don’t need to know, for your own good. It’s better that way.”

“But we don’t prevent them from exploring on their own,” Picard argued. “We don’t stop them at the borders of their solar system and say ‘this far, and no further,’ the way you once threatened to do to us.”

“But you don’t help them either. You don’t explain your ways or your nature to them. Not unless you judge them worthy.” Q crossed his arms. “Besides, I thought you didn’t want higher life forms interfering with your Federation, either. You certainly didn’t like it when I offered to make Riker a Q.”

“There’s a difference between offering information and ‘interfering.’ You would have taken away what makes Riker human. I don’t want us to lose our humanity, anymore than I want those primitive cultures we visit to lose their identity. But I want us to expand beyond our borders, to seek out the unknown, to learn from it.”

“Are you so sure there’s a difference?” Q looked up at the temple. “You keep yourselves a secret from planet-bound cultures because you know that the mere knowledge of you would irreparably change who they are. You humans simply cannot understand the Q and remain human. It would drive you mad.”

“I don’t believe that,” Picard said. “We humans are more than you give us credit for. We are capable of learning.”

Q shook his head derisively. “That same human arrogance of yours, Jean-Luc. Be careful that you don’t let it get in over your head.”

Picard picked up another roasted fungus and started to eat it. He hesitated, his manners surfacing. “Would you like one?” he asked. 

“I don’t need to eat,” Q said. “Really, Picard, I’d have expected you to know that.”

“I know you don’t  _ need  _ to. But would you  _ like  _ to? They’re quite good.”

“I know, I made them.”

“So try a taste of your handiwork.” Picard passed the fungus to Q, who took it.

Q tilted the fungus up to the light to examine it, and then, gingerly, took a small bite and chewed. Picard watched the expression on his face.

“Hmmm,” Q said, swallowing. “It’s . . . interesting. Do you people really do this every day? Just sticking random pieces of biological debris into your orifices?”

Picard laughed. “You make it sound so disgusting, Q. Eat up.”

Q did so, with a contemplative look on his face. 

That night, the two of them sat outside around the fire again. Picard stared up at the stars, contemplative.

* * *

 

“It’s hard to believe,” Q said quietly, “That this is the only sky I will ever see again. I was bored enough when I had the whole universe as my playground. What am I going to do, stuck on one planet for the rest of my days?”

Picard shook his head. “I don’t know. I’ve spent most of my life in Starfleet. Even before that, joining Starfleet was all I ever wanted, since I was a child. Being confined to one planet . . . it won’t be easy for me, either.” He wondered if one of the lights up there in the sky was the Enterprise, if he would ever see the inside of a starship again. If he would ever see Riker, or Beverly, or Data again. “Do you truly believe there’s no way off of this planet?” he asked.

Q was silent for a little too long. Suddenly suspicious, Picard fixed him with a glare. “Q,” he said, “If you’re hiding something from me - if there’s a way out of here that you’re not telling me - ”

“There is,” Q said. “But you won’t like it.”

“What?” Picard asked.

“I can’t get us out of here because the bindings the Q put in place affect me personally, and you can’t get us out of here because you’re human, and you don’t have the power to affect the bindings at all. What we need is another Q.” There was a long pause, as Picard’s heart sank. “I could make you that Q, and then you could free me from the bindings.”

“Like you did Riker?” Picard asked, a sense of cold dread coming over him. “When you gave him your powers?”

“No,” Q said, flopping down on the ground. “It couldn’t be  _ my  _ power, even if you were the one wielding it. I would have to complete the transformation - make you  _ truly  _ a Q.”

“I would have to lose my humanity,” Picard said. 

“But we’d be free!” Q said. He gestured up at the sky. “We’d never have to see the same stars twice. We could go anywhere. Didn’t you say you wanted to learn about the unknown?”

“But not like this,” Picard said. “Not at the cost of who and what I am.”

“The unknown always changes you, Picard,” Q said. “Your life would be incomprehensible to a human living just a thousand years ago.”

“But I am still  _ human,  _ whatever my life is like,” Picard argued.

“Are you?” Q shrugged. “Your heart isn’t human. Geordi’s eyes aren’t human. Who are you to define humanity?”

“That’s - different,” Picard protested. “My artificial heart allows me to survive.”

“And Geordi’s implants?” Q asked. “He doesn’t  _ need  _ to see. Plenty of humans have lived and died without ever having sight.”

“He would have trouble serving on a starship without it.”

Q grinned, sitting up and giving him a ‘gotcha’ look. “Yes. Without it, he’d be stuck on one planet. Just like we are.”

Picard went silent. He couldn’t stop thinking about the thing in the temple. Every instinct in him revolted at the thought of being transformed into something like that. He had always defined himself by his humanity. To lose that - no, to willingly give that up - it was more than he could bear. 

Q saw his answer on his face. The entity snorted derisively and lay back down. “So much for not being afraid of the unknown.”

Picard couldn’t respond to that. Instead, he banked the fire and got to his feet. “I’m going to go to sleep.” He went back into the antechamber and laid down, covering himself with the pile of leaves and using his uniform shirt for a pillow. It was chilly and uncomfortable. Tomorrow he’d have to go into town and try to barter for some bedding.

“Jean-Luc.”

Picard looked up, and found Q crouching over him.

“What?” he asked. 

“Let me keep you warm,” Q said.

Picard knew he should say no. But he was tired, and last night, without Q, had been cold and restless. He wanted Q’s warmth and Q’s company.

“All right,” Picard said, and rolled over to let Q hold him.

Q wrapped himself around him, his touch surprisingly gentle. Picard shut his eyes and listened to Q breathing as he drifted off to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think I accidentally missed yesterday's update. Around the time I should've been updated, I tripped and sprained my ankle, which you wouldn't THINK would prevent someone from updating their WIP, but I guess I was too preoccupied with "ouch my ankle" to think about this story at all. Thank you for your patience! As always, if you like this chapter, or otherwise have any constructive commentary, please leave me a comment!


	5. Goods and Services

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains discussion of suicide, albeit in an extremely unrealistic context. Proceed with caution.

The next morning, Picard got up and headed out into the wilds, his phaser in hand.

“What are you doing?” Q asked, his flickering form catching up with Picard.

“The locals still use fire to control the temperature of their dwellings, correct?” Picard asked.

“Yes, I suppose so. It’s all terribly primitive.”

“Then they need wood to burn.” Picard found an appropriately sized tree and adjusted the settings on his phaser. He used it to laser a notch into the side of the tree, and then to cut through its trunk, felling it. 

“Look at you, becoming a logger,” Q said, with amusement. “I thought you people had evolved beyond such ways of devastating your local ecosystems. What would Starfleet Command think?”

“Starfleet Command understands that one must use the materials available in a survival situation,” Picard said, starting to slice the tree into logs with his phaser. “You could help, instead of standing there making snide comments.”

Q scowled. He reached out and waved a transparent hand through the tree trunk. “Yes, I’m sure that would be  _ very  _ helpful. I can’t even move it at this distance. It’s appalling.”

“Q,” Picard said, frowning, “Why can’t you leave the temple?”

“Oh, I can,” Q said. “But the moment I do, I risk the locals seeing me. Or, worse, you seeing me.” He crossed his arms sulkily. “I didn’t used to care what happened to mortals who saw my true form. Everything was much easier back in those days.”

“You can’t make yourself invisible, or change your shape?” Picard asked.

Q shook his head. “No. The one thing I can’t do is change my own nature. Another Q could do it for me, but I don’t exactly see them lining up to help.”

“I’m sorry,” Picard said. “It must be difficult, being trapped in that ruin all alone.”

“I don’t need your pity,” Q snapped. “ _ You  _ can’t even manipulate objects a few scant meters away from  _ your  _ body.”

“That’s true,” Picard allowed. He finished cutting the tree into logs, and sighed as he realized he was going to have to haul them all the way to Quachil by hand. He gathered as many as he could carry into his arms and started walking. “But there are benefits to being mortal, too,” he said. “We’re not as limited as you think.”

Q made a derisive noise. “Like what?” he asked. “What benefits are there?”

“You told me yourself that you’ve grown bored of the stars,” Picard said. “Life has meaning when it is finite, when each new experience could be your last. That desire, that urgency drives us on, does not allow us to become complacent. It’s why we’ve come so far in the last millennium.”

Q snorted. “You haven’t come that far at all.”

“From nuclear ashes to the stars?” Picard asked, raising his eyebrows. “I think we have.”

“Oh, don’t act like you’re not still two seconds away from blowing yourselves to smithereens at any given time,” Q said. “What about that time paradox you created that almost wiped out humanity?”

Picard shut his eyes in exasperation for a moment. “That was  _ you,  _ Q, you made me do that!”

“No, I just gave you the  _ power  _ to do that. There’s a difference! You didn’t  _ have  _ to go scrambling all over the galaxy making things worse.”

“No, but you did manipulate me into doing it,” Picard said.

Q shrugged. “I told you there are dangerous things out in the galaxy. I never said I wasn’t one of them. Besides, it wasn’t my idea. It was the Continuum’s plan.”

Picard’s eyebrows went up. “I wouldn’t have expected  _ you,  _ of all people, to blindly follow orders,” he said, sternly. “If you have a virtue, I would have thought it to be independence of thought.”

“You can’t just disobey the Q Continuum the way you do Starfleet when their commands violate your uptight sense of morality,” Q snapped. “Otherwise, things like this happen.” He gestured vaguely at the world around them. “Why do you think I’m stuck here, anyway?”

“What did you do?” Picard asked, frowning slightly.

“Haven’t you figured it out by now?” Q asked, sulking.

Picard considered it. “You mean the Continuum is punishing you for helping me to fix the time paradox?” he asked. 

“Among other things,” Q muttered.

Picard sighed, and adjusted the logs in his arms slightly. “Then I suppose I must thank you for your sacrifice,” he said, reluctantly.

Q gave a surprised laugh and glanced over at him. “Careful, Picard. Keep that up, and people might start to think you like me.”

“Perish the thought,” Picard said, dryly.

Q faded out of sight as they neared the town. Picard found himself missing the company as the locals all gave him furtive looks of terror, but he did his best to ignore them. 

He set himself up on a busy street corner, hawking his wares to any passers-by. Most of them refused to stop. He lowered his prices and persisted. A handful of people stopped to buy firewood from him, none of them meeting his eyes. Picard tried to make conversation, but when that failed, he accepted their currency anyway. By the time it started to get dark, he had made enough to buy a blanket and a pillow at one of the stores. 

He tied the blanket around his waist, put the pillow on top of the remaining firewood, and hauled the pile back through the brush to the temple. He was quite pleased at the thought of a real pillow, for a change.

Before he turned in, he went over to the subspace communicator, and booted it up. “Picard to Enterprise,” he said.

“Captain!” came Riker’s voice. “We’re working on a way to get you out of there, but so far we haven’t made much progress. There seems to be something blocking shuttlecraft from reaching the planet. Hold tight.”

Picard shook his head. “That’s fine, Number One. Actually, I was hoping you could do me a favor and transmit audio copies of a few books to my tricorder. I’m a little short of entertainment down here; the locals seem to think I’m cursed.”

“Can do, Captain. Just give me a list of authors.”

“Shakespeare, of course. Melville. Dickens. Dostoyevsky.  Sepok. Arthur Conan Doyle. T’Pav. And . . .  and H.P. Lovecraft, I think.”

“I’ll have Data send them over by tomorrow. How are you holding up down there, sir?” Riker asked.

Picard was silent for a moment. “I have . . . a lot to think about, Number One,” he said. “The prospect of being planet-bound for the rest of my life is not an appealing one.”

“That won’t happen, sir,” Riker assured him. “Data, La Forge, and O’Brien are working around the clock to get you back.”

“Thank you, Number One, but until that happens, I must proceed under the assumption that I will be here for a very long time.” 

“I won’t  _ let  _ that happen,” Riker said, his voice firm. 

In the darkness of the temple, Picard smiled. “I appreciate your determination, Number One.” 

He ended the transmission and lay down with his new pillow and blanket, using the pile of leaves for a mattress. It had been a relief to hear Riker’s voice, but he knew the Enterprise couldn’t remain in orbit around this planet forever. Sooner or later, they would have to leave, and Picard would be left alone here. 

Over the last seven years, Picard had grown to love the crew of the Enterprise. He had only recently admitted that to himself: that his crewmates were not just his subordinates, but also his dearest friends. Beverly, Will, Data, Geordi, Worf, Deanna . . . the thought of never seeing any of  them again made his heart ache. Better to have been in the future Q had shown him, where all of them had drifted apart, than to lose them forever.

As if on queue, the entity in question suddenly appeared kneeling over Picard’s makeshift bed. “Jean-Luc! Jean-Luc, I’ve just thought of another way you can get off this dusty little dead-end planet!”

Picard sat up immediately. “What is it?” he asked, almost not daring to get his hopes up.

“The limitations the Continuum put on this planet are centered around  _ me.  _ If I wasn’t here anymore, the limitations would be gone, and -  _ zweeeeooooooeeeee!”  _ Q imitated the sound of a transporter beam. “You’re free.”

“That’s a good idea, Q, but how exactly do you propose to get  _ yourself  _ off of this planet?” Picard asked, raising an eyebrow. “Might I remind you that you were trapped here before I was?”

“Oh, that’s simple,” Q said, waving this off. “All I have to do is stop existing. It’ll be a little tricky, with the energy limitations, but I’m pretty sure I can do it.”

“What?!” Picard snapped, getting to his feet and tossing his blanket to the ground. “Absolutely not!”

Q got to his feet as well and scowled down at Picard. “Why not? Honestly, Picard, I thought you’d be  _ pleased.  _ You can escape! You don’t have to spend the rest of your life trapped here with me!”

“If I wasn’t willing to let you kill yourself to save the Enterprise, Q, I’m damn well not going to let you kill yourself just to save me from life as a woodcutter!” Picard snapped. 

“You just don’t understand what this is  _ like  _ for me!” Q gestured dramatically. “I had the whole universe at my fingertips, and now I’m stuck here, in this dusty little ruin. This is  _ worse  _ than being human. When I was human, I didn’t have the  _ capacity  _ to remember everything that I’d lost. Life isn’t worth living like this.”

“Life is always worth living, Q,” Picard said, firmly. “Death is no kind of escape for a thinking being.”

“Oh, you and your limited human perspective again.” Q threw his hands up. “I don’t know why I bother, really.”

“It wasn’t that long ago you told me you wanted to spend eternity with me,” Picard said. “And now you’re proposing to commit suicide just because you’re stuck here with me? This is the coward’s way out, Q.”

“That was  _ different,”  _ Q snapped back.

“You of all people should know that life doesn’t always pan out the way you expect it to. But that doesn’t mean you should just throw it all away.” Picard stepped forward and put his hands on Q’s shoulders. “Listen to me: Your life  _ is  _ worth living, no matter what form or what situation you are in. And I will not allow you to sacrifice yourself for me.”

Q wilted under his gaze. “I was trying to help,” he muttered, avoiding Picard’s eyes. 

“I know,” Picard said, making his voice gentle. “But I don’t want that help, not if it comes with such a high cost. Come.” He let go of Q’s shoulders and sat down again on the makeshift leaf mattress. “Sit with me. In the morning, I can show you some of my favorite books, if you like. Together, we can make this life worth living.”

Q stared down at him. “You really are impossibly arrogant, Jean-Luc,” he said, doing his best to maintain his usual smug tone. “To suggest that a few paltry works of human literature could be a substitute for the whole of time and space! The arrogance of it!” But he sat down next to Picard, close enough that their shoulders were touching. 

“You’re a fine one to talk about arrogance,” Picard said, with good humor.

Q leaned against him. “You’re projecting, as always, Jean-Luc,” he said snidely.

Picard patted him on the back and then lay back down on the leaves, pulling his blanket up over him.

Without being invited, Q lay down next to him and slipped under the blanket. The blanket was made of some sort of thick animal hair, and Picard was warm enough under it without company - but he didn’t have the heart to tell Q no. He let Q wrap around him, and sank into sleep, dreaming of the stars.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Time for some slightly apologetic continuity notes: in the time between writing this story and posting it, I watched the Voyager episode "Death Wish" and the original series episode "Is There In Truth Beauty". The former deals with a Q trying to commit suicide, which proves to be more complicated than Q suggests in this story. Then again, in that episode, Quinn was explicitly on suicide watch by the Continuum - it might be easier for Q because the Continuum isn't explicitly trying to prevent him from suicide, since it hasn't occurred to them that they might try. Or maybe, since this story takes place before "Death Wish," Q just doesn't know what would be involved in something like that, and is talking out of his ass. 
> 
> The latter episode, "Is There In Truth Beauty," involves the Federation dealing with an alien that will drive humans mad if they look at it. Apparently, not only has the Federation met Things Man Was Not Meant To Know, they've established diplomatic relations and are on their way to getting some interspecies lovin' on with it, all without any of the angst that Picard deals with here. 
> 
> Ah well. That's what I get for starting fic when I'm only a few seasons into a canon. Still, if you liked this fic, or if you spotted any other continuity flaws, please leave a comment!


	6. Picard's Choice

In the morning, he sliced some more wood with his phaser, and hauled it into town to sell. He was strongly tempted to spend some of his paltry earnings on a hot meal, but he forced himself to just eat another roasted fungus before heading back to the temple. He was getting very sick of eating the same thing day after day.

He was pleased to find that Riker had transmitted the audiobooks to his tricorder as promised. He flicked through the selection of titles, put one on, and relaxed by the fire.

_ “It must be remembered that there is no real reason to expect anything in particular from mankind; good and evil are local expedients - or their lack - and not in any sense cosmic truths or laws. We call a thing ‘good’ because it promotes certain petty human conditions that we happen to like - whereas it is just as sensible to assume that all humanity is a noxious pest and should be eradicated like rats or gnats for the good of the planet or of the universe. There are no absolute values in the whole blind tragedy of mechanistic nature - nothing is good or bad except as judged from an absurdly limited point of view. The only cosmic reality is mindless, undeviating fate - automatic, unmoral, uncalculating inevitability.” _

“Noxious pests, indeed! At least  _ he  _ has some humility.” Q appeared on the other side of the fire.

“He was a monstrous racist,” Picard objected.

“Well, then he had good reason to claim that his species was noxious pests, because he was one,” Q said.

“His own view was limited, not by his humanity, but by the primitive and ignorant values of his own society,” Picard said. “The irony of Lovecraft's work is that he represents a much greater evil than any of the creatures he invents. Fear of the unknown is not inherent to mankind, anymore than cruelty and greed are.”

“Cruelty and greed  _ are  _ inherent to humanity,” Q argued.

“It is inherent that we should struggle with them,” Picard said. “But not that we should allow them to rule us.”

Q snorted. “Your blind optimism never ceases to astonish me, Picard. You reject the very things that make you human, and yet you boast of your humanity."

“The struggle itself has meaning,” Picard said. “We have it in us to rise above.”

“You wouldn’t be human if you could,” Q said. 

“I would have expected you to object to such moral nihilism,” Picard said. “After all, you’ve boasted to me about your own ‘superior morality.’”

“That’s different,” Q said defensively. “We have an objective point of view on the universe.  _ You  _ can’t see more than a tiny, miniscule fraction of reality, and yet you presume to judge it.”

“If you believe the Q Continuum has such superior morals,” Picard asked, “Why did you disobey them?”

Q scowled. “Would you rather I  _ hadn’t?”  _ he snapped. “Maybe I  _ should  _ have let all you scrambling, panicking apes die.”

“I’m not saying I disagree with your choice,” Picard said evenly. “I’m asking why you made it.”

“Don’t ask questions you already know the answers to,” Q snapped, and snapped his fingers. The flash of light was a little sluggish, but when it faded, Q was gone.

Picard sat back down and set the tricorder to play again. He did know why Q had saved humanity. Not because it had been the right thing to do, but because Picard was human, and Q refused to let him die. Perhaps it wasn’t the most noble motive to save an entire species, but it  _ was  _ a very human one, whatever Q claimed.

* * *

 

As they were eating breakfast the next morning, Picard asked, “Do you recall when you came to me, and asked to join my crew?”

Q raised an eyebrow. “If you’re looking for an  _ apology _ , I - ”

Picard held up a hand. “No, I know better than to ever expect you to admit you were wrong. I was merely thinking of something you said then.” He took a bite of his fungus. “You offered to give up your powers if I asked you to, in order to join my crew. Was that in earnest?”

Q crossed his arms. “I suppose so,” he said sulkily.

“If you had, would you have been human?” Picard asked. 

“Something like human, I suppose. I certainly wouldn’t have been a Q.” Q shrugged, avoiding Picard’s eyes.

Picard was silent for awhile, finishing up his breakfast. Then he said, “That is not an offer to be made lightly. To give up one’s own identity, one’s own species, for someone else - I can’t imagine that.” That was a lie. He couldn’t stop thinking about it.

“I knew you didn’t like it when I gave one of your crew my powers. It occurred to me that you might want me to give them up when I joined your ship. If you’re re-thinking that offer,  _ mon capitaine,  _ it’s a bit late.”

“But this isn’t a decision you can simply make for someone else’s comfort,” Picard argued. “You cannot change who you are for someone else. It must be from your own heart.”

“All right, so maybe I was lonely and bored and wanted a change of pace, it wasn’t totally selfless, so sue me,” Q said, crossing his arms around his knees like a sulking child.

“Were you afraid?” Picard asked him, directly.

“Afraid?” Q stared at him. “Why would I be afraid?”

“Afraid of becoming something so different from yourself,” Picard said. “Afraid, perhaps, that you might lose your identity in the transformation.”

Q stared at him, and then a wide grin spread across his features. “This isn’t about me at all, is it? This is about you. You’re thinking of doing it. You’re thinking of letting me make you a Q so that you can get us out of here.”

“I - am considering it, yes,” Picard said, diffidently. “It would be foolish not to give  _ some  _ thought to our only apparent means of egress.” He got to his feet and started to pace. “What would I be, without my humanity?” he asked. “Locutus, or something worse? With all the power in the universe in my hands, would I become like that hapless version of me who never learned to struggle, who never learned to take risks?” He stopped, and ran a hand over his face. “But am I a coward if I would give up all the universe, stay trapped on this planet for the rest of my life, simply because I am afraid to be changed? Life is change. Everything I do, every choice I make, changes me. The cybernetic implants forced on me by the Borg destroyed my identity - but the cybernetic implants Mr. La Forge wears do not. Perhaps the distinction is in choice. Perhaps if I choose, willingly, to give up my humanity, I will remain myself.” He looked over at Q. “I meant it when I told you that humanity has value. But is that value worth giving up everything for? Isn’t there value in exploration, too? In experience? In going where no man has gone?”

“There’s no reason to be afraid of losing your humanity,” Q said. “I had humanity once, and I’ve never been so glad to lose anything in my life.”

“If I stay here, I will never see my friends or family again,” Picard said, lost in his own thoughts. “But if I accept your offer, perhaps I will become something that no longer cares for them, that no longer understands why they are worth preserving.”

“Really, Picard, is that what you think of me?” Q said, offended.

“Would I be wrong to do so?” Picard fixed him with a piercing look. “You threw me and my entire ship to the Borg in a fit of pique. You threatened to have Vash executed if I didn’t play your twisted games. You laughed at me when I told you that your actions got eighteen people killed. Are these the actions of someone who cares? Of someone who has compassion for ‘lesser’ beings?”

“That was a long time ago,” Q said. 

“Yes,” Picard said. “A millennia, you said. Why stay away for so long, and then come back to the same time you left?” 

Q was silent for a long moment, scowling off into space. Then he said, “I needed time to think.”

“Think about what?” Picard pressed.

“You. Me. Humanity. The Q.” Q gestured vaguely. “I wanted to understand humanity better. So I came here. I made this world, these people, in  _ your  _ image. In humanity’s image. As a . . . control group, as your human scientists might say. I thought it would help me to understand why I keep coming back to you.” He sighed. “But it didn’t. So I abandoned them and I went back to you. I knew when you would die, of course, so I went to then. I’d finally figured out how I could pay you back for saving my life, you see.”

“So you decided to save my life in return,” Picard said. “You  _ did  _ learn something about humanity in all those centuries.”

Q made a face. “Oh, don’t be so provincial. Humans didn’t invent empathy.”

“No,” Picard said. “But  _ you  _ learned it from us, didn’t you?” 

Q didn’t answer.

“Would you do it again?” Picard asked. “If we weren’t trapped here, on this planet, if you had all the power in the universe again, and I told you you could join my crew if you gave up your powers - would you do it?”

“Yes,” Q said.

Picard went silent. “Would it be reversible?” he asked. “Would I be able to return to humanity?” Even as he said it, he knew it wouldn’t be that simple. It couldn’t be.

“Yes,” Q said. “But if you did, the Continuum would kill you. You’ve escaped their notice so far, but if you dared to defy them by reversing their judgement, you would become their enemy. And if you were a human, they would crush you like an insect.”

The silence stretched between them. After a few long moments, Picard coughed, and bent down to pick up his phaser. “I’m going into town to sell off the rest of the wood,” he said, not looking directly at Q.

He went into town, but he didn’t bring the wood. Instead, he took yesterday’s earnings, and went into the cafe/bar he had visited when he first came to Larich. He took a seat at the bar, and watched the faces around him. Human faces, human minds. He felt separated from them, as if he was already something less than human. 

He looked through the menu and ordered a drink at random. The bartender didn’t speak to him, simply took his money and gave him a frothy mug. Picard took a sip. It was sweet, piping hot, and alcoholic. Stronger than what Picard was used to - real alcohol, not the synthehol the replicators produced. He didn’t usually drink strong liquor, but he thought he could be forgiven in this instance.

“You look like you’ve had a rough day.” 

Picard looked up to see a woman about his age sitting down on the stool next to him. “Not a bad one,” he said. “Not exactly. Just a strange one.”

“Around here, we say that ‘bad’ and ‘strange’ are the same thing,” the woman said. “But I guess you don’t believe in that, huh.”

“No,” Picard said. “No, I don’t.”

The woman took a sip of her drink. “My daughter thinks you’re the harbinger of the Apocalypse,” she said. “People around here aren’t used to strangers - much less strangers who go in and out of the Temple of the Old Gods.”

“I didn’t know it had a name,” Picard said. “I’m not the harbinger of anything - just a traveller, trying to get home.”

“If that’s true,” the woman said, “Then you should be careful. Lots of wild rumors spreading about you. Sooner or later, someone is going to have the guts to act on ‘em. Me, I think that an emissary of the Old Gods wouldn’t have anything to fear from a knife to the back. But a human stranger whose only crime is visiting a town full of frightened people - he might have something to worry about.”

“I thank you for the warning,” Picard said. “But I don’t think I have much to be worried about. I’m leaving town soon.”

“Oh?” the woman said. “Where are you going?”

“Home,” Picard said. “For a little while, at least.” He stared down into his drink.

“They say you can’t go home again,” the woman said, noncommittally.

“They may be right,” Picard said. He took a gulp from his drink, and then glanced over at the woman. “You know, you’re the first person in this town to try to talk to me like a fellow human, instead of treating me with suspicion and distrust.”

“People here, they forget that we’re all strangers to someone,” the woman said. “They’d rather be afraid than reach out a hand to someone who’s in need.”

Picard smiled. “Thank you, then, for trying to help,” he said. “It’s good to be reminded that there is still good in people. Especially today.”

“If you don’t mind me saying so,” the woman said, “You look more like a man who’s going to the gallows than a man who’s going home.”

“Perhaps, in a way, I am,” Picard said. “I am afraid too. As much as anyone in this town. But then again, I suppose to be human is to fear.”

“Yeah,” the woman said. “But you gotta face your fears.”

“You’re right, of course,” Picard said. He finished his drink and stood. “It was a pleasure to meet you,” he said. “But I must be getting back. There’s someone waiting for me.”

“Good luck,” the woman said, “If you really are human. I hope whatever you’re afraid of - that it isn’t as bad as you expect.”

“We shall see,” Picard said, and started the long walk back to the temple.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, we're in the home stetch now - just one more chapter left. As always, please leave a comment telling me what you think!
> 
> Next chapter: it gets Weird.


	7. Chapter 7

“Q,” he said, walking into the antechamber. “I’m ready.”

Q’s human form appeared in front of him. “Are you sure?” he asked. “You don’t look ready.”

“I am - frightened, yes,” Picard admitted. “But I told you: I am a thinking being. I will not allow my base instincts to rule me. I choose this, Q.”

Q looked him up and down, and then nodded sharply. “All right. Come into the central room with me.” He took Picard’s hand and led him through the door. 

Picard stared at the floor. He was afraid to look up. Something in him was screaming already.

“It’s all right,” Q said, gently. “Look up,  _ mon capitaine.  _ It’s only me.”

Picard forced his gaze up and looked into the writhing, shifting horror that filled the temple’s ceiling. His mind struggled to understand what he was seeing, to put it into some sort of familiar, human context. He wanted to look away. He wanted to run.

He didn’t.

The entity reached out for him with tendrils of energy and flesh. His skin burned and crawled under their touch, but he reached out and wrapped his hands around one, holding it close. “Q,” he managed, as the tendrils lifted him up and surrounded him.

_ Jean-Luc,  _ Q’s voice echoed in his head, simultaneously one voice and thousands, echoing, filling his head. It was full of affection.

The tendrils pulled at his body, his flesh warping and shifting under their touch, pulled apart into new and alien shapes. Picard started screaming, in agony and in horror, and felt his mind shifting, too, expanding and twisting, power and information flooding in. He looked down at himself and saw his legs melting into shapes that defied geometry, splitting and branching and writhing.

He couldn’t stop screaming, couldn’t fight the horror of what was happening to him, of what he was being turned into. But he didn’t struggle, and he didn’t ask Q to stop, not even when the screaming went silent and he realized it was because he no longer had a mouth or lungs to scream with. He held on to one thought:  _ I choose this. I choose this. I choose this. _

He couldn’t tell how long it lasted, or when the pain turned to pleasure, the horror to excitement. He found himself reaching out for Q, helping his transformation along, using his newfound powers to eagerly rip away the shreds of his own humanity. He felt free, in a way he never had before, and Q’s form seemed as beautiful to him as it had seemed horrifying before. The world around them was bright and new, full of colors and dimensions that Picard had never seen before.

_ It’s done,  _ Q said. 

Picard saw the bindings the Continuum had placed on Q, now as solid and as visible to Picard as steel. He reached out and tore them off effortlessly, and felt the universe open up to them.

_ Yes!  _ Q exhilarated.  _ We’re free, Jean-Luc, we’re free!  _ He caught one of Picard’s tendrils with his own, and tugged him sideways through subspace, teleporting them into orbit around the planet. Picard saw the Enterprise as he had never seen it before, a cloud of EM radiation and subspace signals, each component revealed to his senses at a mere glance. 

_ Can they see us?  _ Picard asked.

_ No,  _ Q said.  _ We’re on a different plane.  _

Picard reached down into the Enterprise’s bridge and created a facsimile, an illusion of his human body. 

The bridge crew startled as he appeared in a flash of light. Q appeared next to him, a moment later. “Captain!” Riker said, a surprised smile spreading across his face. He was sitting in the Captan’s chair. “You made it out! We were beginning to get worried about you.” He got up, vacating the seat for Picard.

Picard remained standing. He smiled sadly at Riker. “I made it out. I wanted to see you again - all of you. Would you call the senior staff for a meeting? I must speak to all of them, face to face.” He winced at his phrasing. “Or as close as possible,” he said. 

“I think that’s the Captain’s job,” Riker said, grinning. He saluted. “Commander Riker, returning command of the USS Enterprise to Captain Picard, sir!”

“I’m sorry, Riker,” Picard said. “But I can’t accept that. The ship is yours now.”

Riker’s grin vanished. “What? But you - ” His eyes darted to Q. “What are you making him do?” he demanded of the entity.

“Me?” Q said, drawing himself up. “Not  _ everything  _ in the universe is my fault, you know! He didn’t even tell me he was going to resign, although I suppose I should’ve guessed.”

“Q is telling the truth,” Picard confirmed. “The Enterprise is the flagship of the Federation. I don’t believe it’s right for me to command it. Please, I’ll explain fully once the others are here.”

Riker obeyed. Picard walked with him down to the briefing room. It felt false. Moving his facsimile felt like manipulating a puppet’s strings, and to his enhanced senses, every little way in which its movements were wrong or inhuman was glaringly obvious.

_ No wonder you move like you do,  _ he said to Q.  _ I always thought you were just being melodramatic. _

_ Well,  _ Q allowed,  _ I am that too. _

Picard sat at the conference table, in Riker’s usual spot, waiting for the crew to hurry in. He was relieved to feel a rush of affection for the familiar faces of his dearest friends. He’d been afraid they would seem lesser to him, that he would no longer care for them. But he did. 

“Captain!” La Forge said, coming in last. He grinned. “Looks like we were wasting all that time trying to beam you up. How’d you get out of there?”

“That’s what I’ve called you all here to explain,” Picard said. The solemn look on his face made La Forge’s grin slip.

“He says he’s resigning his commission,” Riker said.

This produced some outcry from the crew. Picard held up a hand. “I understand why you’re all surprised. But I have no choice. I cannot, in good conscience, continue to captain this ship as if I were the same man who was assigned to its command, because I am not.”

“Why?” asked Data.

“Because he’s not human anymore,” said Troi. Picard looked at her, and knew that she sensed he was different, that she suspected what had happened. 

“Not human anymore?” Riker said, incredulously. “He looks human enough.”

“I chose to appear to you as you know me,” Picard answered. “But this is not my true form. Counselor Troi is correct. I am not human. I am - well, I suppose I am a Q.” It sounded odd to say. 

“What?!” Riker exclaimed. “Of all the - after the way you lectured me when Q offered me the same deal?!” 

Picard looked away. “It wasn’t an easy choice,” he said. “But I wanted to see the stars again. And I - I suppose I may have been wrong to counsel you against accepting Q’s offer. I have always believed in humanity’s potential. Perhaps this is one way to realize it.”

“If that’s the case,” Riker said, “Then why are you leaving us?”

“I don’t want to,” Picard admitted. “But it is wrong to hold a command position while also wielding power such as this. I would only get in the way of your exploration, Riker. Besides - ” He smiled at Riker. “It’s long past time for you to get your own ship. You never wanted to leave the Enterprise to become a captain. Now you can do both.”

“I never wanted to take your place!” Riker snapped. “You know that, sir.” 

“I do,” Picard agreed. “But nevertheless, you must. It’s time.”

“What do you intend to do now?” Troi asked him.

“Explore the universe, I suppose,” Picard said. He offered her a wry little smile. “I imagine there’s enough of it to keep me occupied for a long time.”

“So that’s it?” LaForge said, incredulously. “You just turn into some kind of alien god and then pop off into space? After seven years?”

Picard sighed. “I’ll still visit,” he promised. “But you’ll do fine without me, all of you.”

“We will miss you, Captain,” Data said. 

“This is really what you want, Jean-Luc?” Dr. Crusher spoke up for the first time. Her eyes were fixed on his. There was grief in them, but also determination. She would not ask him to stay for her, no matter how much it hurt her to watch him leave.  “He isn’t manipulating you? This isn’t some game of his?”

Picard shook his head. “No. I do believe this is for the best, Beverly.”

“Then I can’t tell you no,” Dr. Crusher said. She stood up, and approached him. “Captain, I - “

Picard smiled at her. “I know,” he said, reaching to a hand to put on her shoulder. “I know.”

She leaned in and kissed him, a brief press of lips, and then stepped away. Picard watched her go, thinking,  _ In another world, we could have . . . _

“Captain,” Riker said. “It has been an honor to serve with you. I couldn’t have asked for a better CO.”

“And I couldn’t have asked for a better first officer, Number One,” Picard said. “You are one of the finest Starfleet officers I have ever known.”

Riker stepped forward suddenly, and pulled him into a tight hug. Picard froze, and then awkwardly patted Riker on the back. He knew that if this had still been his real body, if he had still been as connected to it as he once was, there would have been tears on his face. He held Riker.

“I have learned a great deal about humanity from you, Captain,” Data said. “You have always helped me to learn and defended my rights without question. I am proud to have served under you.” He walked up, and shook Picard’s hand. 

Worf came up next. “Go with honor, Captain,” he said, gruffly. “Wherever it is you’re going.” His eyes were suspiciously bright.

LaForge just saluted him. “It’s been an honor, Captain. If you come back here, try not to put humanity on trial, okay?”

“I think I can promise that,” Picard said, smiling. 

Finally, Picard knew it was time to leave. He stepped back from his friends. “You are the greatest crew I could have been given. All the years we’ve spent together . . . I have no regrets. It’s been an honor to know each and every one of you, and I will miss you.”

And he snapped his fingers and vanished. 

Out in the darkness of space, Picard and Q watched the Enterprise leave orbit.

* * *

 

_ Now what?  _ Picard asked Q.  _ Even if I wanted to, I doubt we could go to the Continuum. Will they hunt us down? _

_ Maybe. But it’s a big universe.  _ Q’s energy tendrils glittered with mischief.  _ They’ll have to find us first.  _ He reached out and twined his tendrils around Picard’s.  _ Come on. I have a whole universe to show you. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, that's the end, everyone! Thank you to everyone who read and commented. I'm proud of this story, as weird as it may be. I hope you all enjoyed!

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is complete, at 7 chapters, and although I'm staggering out the updates, it's not really a WIP. Nontheless, I'd love to hear your comments on the first chapter!


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